What’s it about?

Experiential events designed to inform, inspire and empower people living and working with mental distress. More>>

Who’s it for?

Anyone curious about a fresh approach, including people and families with personal experience of mental distress, frontline staff, commissioners, managers, clinicians, policymakers and Third Sector staff.

We bring together influential speakers and facilitators who are passionate about changing the script around mental health, challenging stigma and raising expectations. More>>

“Succeeded in bringing together professionals, experts and everyday folk in a way where the reality of human experience was revealed, shared and honoured, and those who suffer were given tools that help.”

Our Speakers in Jan 2019

Watch…

During a quarter-century documenting indigenous cultures, human-rights photographer and filmmaker Phil Borges was intrigued by how differently psychosis is defined and treated in the West. Through interviews with renowned mental health professionals including Gabor Mate, MD, Robert Whitaker, and Roshi Joan Halifax, PhD, Phil explores the growing severity of the mental health crisis in America dominated by biomedical psychiatry. He discovers a growing movement of professionals and psychiatric survivors who demand alternative treatments that focus on recovery, nurturing social connections, and finding meaning.

‘The Doctor who hears voices’ Channel 4 documentary telling the story of clinical psychologist, Rufus May‘s, work with Ruth, a junior doctor hearing a voice telling her to kill herself. The film follows Ruth’s unorthodox journey with Rufus as she strives to combat the voice and regain her job.

A film about the compassionate approach to relating with voices. A project led by Dr Charlie Heriot-Maitland, in collaboration with Kate Anderson, independent animation director. See Compassion For Voices a website to support compassionate approaches to voices and other experiences.

Open Dialogue could revolutionise mental-health care in the UK. Currently being piloted in four NHS trusts, the North East London Foundation Trust’s Open Dialogue-based service opened in May this year for patients referred from anywhere in the country. In results from the past 30 years from Finland, where it originated, 74 per cent of patients experiencing psychosis are back at work within two years, compared with just 9 per cent in the UK. Crucially, relapse rates are far lower than here: after an average of two years’ treatment, most patients don’t need to come back – ever.